


sparkling crystal souls aglow

by We_deserve_rainbows



Series: Mechtober 2020 [5]
Category: High Noon Over Camelot - The Mechanisms (Album)
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, Fluff, Grief, Multi, nongraphic depictions of violence, teenage idealism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-15
Updated: 2020-10-15
Packaged: 2021-03-09 04:40:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,024
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27018940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/We_deserve_rainbows/pseuds/We_deserve_rainbows
Summary: HNOC + Sunlight
Relationships: Arthur/Guinevere/Lancelot (High Noon Over Camelot)
Series: Mechtober 2020 [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1949812
Comments: 1
Kudos: 17





	sparkling crystal souls aglow

From the perspective of an outsider, the Pendragon's life would seem to consist of nothing but violence and liquor and hate. From the perspective of the Pendragons, however, their lives have been naught but sunshine and love. 

The Pendragons were young once. When they had first fallen in love they had been idealistic and yearned to rid the world of injustice together. They spun golden dreams of peace and prosperity on Fort Galfridian, they sat together and hoped.

“Nah just think of it Lance! Us three, ridin into town together,” Arthur said, waving the hand that wasn't holding Lancelots’ above the three of them, hope and happiness brimming in his eyes. 

Lancelot rolled his eyes but smiled affectionately at Arthur, “Sure, dear, and when is that gonna happen?” 

Guinevere, who was laying with her head on Arthurs lap, hummed, and opened her eyes to look up at Lancelot, “Oh come on, I've been subjected to your ‘a new age of justice’ rants for years now,” Arthur nodded and stuck his tongue out at Lancelot.

Lancelot blushed and laughed nervously, “Well…” 

Arthur looked at Lancelot and smirked, making Guinevere laugh.

Lancelot looked away and smiled, “Oh shush, both of y’all!” Arthur laughed good-naturedly and squeezed Lancelot's hand. 

Guinevere sat up and leaned over to pepper kisses onto Lancelot's cheek, “Maybe you shouldn't have been poking fun at Arthur, love.” 

He laughed and nodded, “Alright, Alright, I concede!” he said, dramatically falling back onto the bed they were sitting on. The sun coming through Guinevere's bedroom window shone on his face and made his hair seem to halo around his head. He squinted against the light and smiled an easy smile that made his two lovers' hearts fill with love. “We’ll be the best damn sheriffs the world has ever seen.”

Arthur nodded, satisfied that he had ‘won’, despite the fact there was nothing to be won, and went to lay next to his lover, taking Lancelot's hand and burying his face in his warm neck.

Guinevere looked at the two of them and smiled, warmth flowing through her heart as sunlight flowed through the window. Her loves, her best friends. Her soul belonged to both of them as theirs belonged to her. The fluorescent light that danced on their faces made them seem older than they were. It illuminated every scar, every line on their faces. 

Guinevere would later look back on that and wonder how that was. They were so young, and yet already battered and bruised by the unfair world. And yet, not enough to become disillusioned with the idea of making it better. 

She may have been young, but she was raised by her fathers, who had been beaten and broken by the world. She knew the way that an unfair life made a person look, she knew the way it wore them down to just a husk of what they had dreamed to be. She wouldn't let that happen to them, she would make sure that they did good in the world. She would make sure that her lovers would be okay. 

She took Lancelot's other hand and lay next to them, her doves both hummed happily when they felt her familiar weight and she held them both, the quiet that followed broken by scattered promises, and declarations of love.

Yes, the Pendragons had been young once. They were not young anymore. Now, as they laid in their bed, they were wiser and more cruel than they ever thought they would become when they were young. But nonetheless, rulers they were. Good rulers, too, Camelot was flourishing, well, as much as it was possible to ‘flourish’ nowadays. 

People came from everywhere to seek safety and peace under the Pendragons lead. They had brought a golden period to Camelot that it desperately needed. 

They were happy, despite their cruelty, and despite their tiredness, they were happy.

Once again they were laying in bed. Well, Guinevere and Arthur were laying in bed, clinging to each other like they had when they were children, Lancelot was pacing around the room, staring at his beloved's with worry etched deep on his face. 

He loved them, loved them both more than it would ever be possible to make them know. He cared about them, of that, there was no doubt, but it wasn't the halcyon days that they so often had that was on his mind that night. It was the heat. The heat had gotten steadily worse over the years, choking their livestock and cooking their fish in the lakes where they lived. but this was the first year that they had found the consequences quite so severe. 

On a routine scouting trip, some of their knights had reported an entire village dead. Whether it was dehydration or heat stroke, they couldn't say, the smell had driven away the scouting party soon after.

This hadn’t seemed to bother Arthur or Guinevere too much, beside the grief of losing human life, they hadn't thought too hard about it. Lancelot, however, having taken up the hobby of keeping track of the temperature throughout the years, knew that this wasn't going to be an isolated incident. And he was scared. 

Scared for himself, scared for his town, but most of all, scared for his family. For his lovers and their child. Morgause was already so much like her parents, with all the vim and bravery and cleverness in the world. She was perfect. Lancelot was terrified. He knew that his lovers cared about, perhaps more than her biological mother did. So he hoped that he might be able to convince them to let her take Morgause somewhere safe, somewhere away from the ceaseless heat.

He paused at the foot of the bed and his chest ached with love. His lovers were the most important thing to him, he wondered how he would be able to get through the day without the steady, calming presence of Guinevere or the brightness of Arthur. He didn't think he could do it, living without them would be worse than death. He smiled, his worry quelled as he gazed at their faces, lit only by the light of the town reflected back from the metal all around them. 

He turned to the window and his chest ached with pain. He wasn't ready to lose his child. Their child. Morgause, who was smart and kind. Who charmed all that sought the Pendragons council or company. His child who was in danger, and who he needed to send away. to keep her safe. The world outside lightened and his heart was chilled with the burden of his decision. 

He turned back to his beloved’s and took his place in their bed, letting the warmth of his lover’s embrace flow through him, and fill his heart with love, and his mind with spun gold of happy endings. 

Once, there had been three lovers. Three people who cared about each other more than anything else. They had had a child, once. She was sent away, her parents waved goodbye to her as she walked away, hand in hand with her mother. He had come back, no longer a child, but a young man named Mordred. He saw his parents, still holding onto the last remnants of power in a dying world.

Arthur remembered his child, vague misty memories of a happier time. But now he only had his lovers. The two people that he cared about most in the world, he would never let anything happen to them. He would protect them, and he trusted them to protect him.

As they rode up to where Galahad said the GRAIL would be he took a few minutes to study the two people who had shared his life for so many years now.

He looked at Guinevere, her dark eyes looking ahead, and she looked like the kind of person that could handle anything. But he knew her better. He knew by the way she gripped the reins of her horse and by the way she sat that she was just as scared as he was. 

He looked at Lancelot, his face looking at ease and confident, as if he knew what was ahead and had already faced it. Years ago, when they were so, so, much younger than they were now, Lancelot had confided in Arthur. He told him of all the years he spent trying to perfect that expression. 

His heart ached for both of them, and he wanted nothing more than to take them both away from here. Back to the halcyon days of years long since past, back to when they were safe. He hoped and prayed and wished for his lovers to be safe in the minutes to come, and he rode up to the door.

They got off of their horses and stood together, horrified, as Galahad walked into turret fire and laughed. At the first gunshot that had reached for each other, knowing that if they were going to die, they wanted to hold each other one more time before they went. The bullets weren't for them though, and as the guns clicked dry they loosened their wild grips on one another and walked hesitantly up to the door. 

The door slid open to reveal a man, who they shot dead just as he attempted to speak. They took the GRAIL, and placed it in the center of the lifepod, and waited in silence as the lifepod rose through the bowels of the station until they stood at the round table.

Then, the words that struck first fear, and then greed, into the heart of each of the Pendragons. 

“Please designate a captain for final authorization.” 

Arthur looked at his lovers, the heat making his mind foggy as he saw them place their hands over their guns, and felt his hand move to his own weapon. 

They stood like that, the lure of power more complete than any other warred with the most all-encompassing love he had ever felt in the heart of Arthur. 

And then, love had won. No words were spoken, but their hands fell to their sides and they each smiled at each other, a smile reminiscent of their youth, of what they had felt when they had first fallen in love. They knew that it was going to be okay, that Arthur would drive them away from the heat, and they would be able to spend the rest of their lives together. 

The love and hope in Arthur's heart had never been more complete. 

And then, three shots rang out and he watched as the two people he loved most in the world fell dead. He didn't even register the pain in his stomach, the shock of seeing Guinevere and Lancelot fall overriding all other feeling. Mordred walked in, tears falling freely, he looked at Guinevere and Lancelot.

“I'm sorry mom,” and knelt down to close Guinevere’s glassy eyes, and then walked slowly over to Lancelot folding his father's hands over his chest, “dad,”.

He walked up to Arthur, his father now recognized him, but the pain and hate of losing those he loved most in the world tinted his vision in red, “You.” 

“I'm sorry father.” Mordred spared one last tearful look at his dead parents before he dragged his father's bleeding body into the lifepod. 

Arthur has launched away from the station, away from the endless burning pain of the sun… away from all that he had ever held dear. His blood ran with rage and fear and sorrow and pain. The burning pain of being sent miles away from those that he had shared his soul with for so long, and knowing that there was so, so much he could have done. 

And as he looked at the rings on his hand, the silver for Guinevere and the brass for Lancelot, he sobbed, the cries of a broken man echoed around the lifepod. But the light of the sun cast it all in gold, his face was cast in brilliance as he watched his lovers and his child fall into the sun. 

Arthur was alone.


End file.
